Deconstructing Hell Discourse

Among those who believe that the end state of unbelievers is Eternal Conscious Torment (ECT), there is a widely popular sentiment that goes like this: "of course, we wouldn't have put hell into our theology if we were free to just make things up, but we're constrained by the text."

This sentiment strikes me as a red flag.

It would be one thing if this sentiment were expressed primarily by people who hadn't thought about it much, but I see this from academics in their accounts of hell. But if God is the source of all joy, and God has revealed his character by revealing the nature of hell to us, then the nature of hell ought to be a source of joy. Once we understand hell--whatever our account winds up being--that understanding should be a source of joy and we should end up in a place where we can glorify God for it.

The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article on hell is, as often, helpful for getting our bearings here. That article divides up views based on which of three incompatible premises one rejects:

1. All human sinners are equal objects of God’s redemptive love in the sense that God wills or aims to win over each one of them over time and thereby to prepare each one of them for the bliss of union with the divine nature.

1. God’s redemptive love will triumph in the end and successfully win over each and every object of that love, thereby preparing each one of them for the bliss of union with the divine nature.

1. Some human sinners will never be reconciled to God and will therefore remain separated from the divine nature forever.

There also seem to be three accounts of what happens to unbelievers when they die:

1. ETC

1. Annihilation

1. Salvation

ETC feels really uncomfortable for most of us, so I want to explain why I don't find the other two all that much better, and then I want to explain why I end up still--tentatively--endorsing ETC.

First off, annihilation doesn't really strike me as all that much better than ECT because it just looks like a pared-down version. It still seems like irreversible total punishment, and, sure, I wouldn't be conscious for it, but I'm not too sure that annihilationism can succeed if ECT fails. The same objections can be raised, just a tad less forcefully. Most of its appeal seems, to me, to stem from its preserving most of ECT without actually being ECT.

Next, if we suppose that unbelievers go to heaven, we have to hold that they get transformed in the ways that believers get transformed to be holy and perfect. That comes across, to me, like non-consensual brainwashing. I'll admit, the rapid transformation of believers on reaching heaven sometimes strikes me as uncomfortable in similar ways, but at least that is transformation that we are striving for and asking for. For the believer, the rapid transformation is endorsed and desired. For the unbeliever it is a transformation which they have been resisting. So, universalism--at least of the quick variety--seems violating.

As an aside, I am sympathetic to the idea that those in hell might be able to repent at a later date. I don't know how optimistic we should be about that, and I don't know what we should think about the dynamics of life in hell that might allow for that, but it does seem to avoid the worst of both universalist brainwashing and the ECT account.

So why might we prefer ECT? I've suggested that our alternatives aren't that great either, but we really want to see how we might (here and now) rejoice in some account of hell.

Here is my hypothesis: you will see much more discomfort with hell amongst those with power and comfort. Hell is meant to comfort the oppressed. When we are oppressed, we desire for our oppressors to get what is coming to them. Often this desire is resisted in (at least white evangelical) Christian circles, because it seems to violate the command to love our enemies. I think this is a mistake. I think we are right to be angry at oppression and desire the oppressor to fall. It would be best for them to fall in this life, see their errors, and repent. Nevertheless, God will prove them wrong in the end. Hell is the proof that, however much we feel like people get away with murder--of black people, the trans community, Ukrainians, Christians, or whoever is being unjustly oppressed and killed, deprived of the resources they need to live, and ignored--nevertheless, God sees and stores up his wrath for the day of judgment.

Our anger is tempered with patience in light of the promise of hell.

Our fallen hearts often want to see people suffer for their injustices. We should, I think, resist the temptation to hope that people will not repent so that they can receive the punishment. Like Jonah, we sometimes hope they will not repent because we know that God shows mercy. This under-appreciates the depth of conversion and redemption. When God redeems, when God brings repentance, there is such transformation as to reconcile the oppressor with those they oppressed. To some extent, this very depth is why a rapid universalism strikes me as brainwashing: to think otherwise seems to underestimate how great a transformation we are in need of for perfection.